any info on REston and Herndon schools...ES and MS....

[Anonymous]

thank you!

[Anonymous]

What do you want to know? We live in Reston and love it and our ES.

[Anonymous]

wondering where the nice family-oriented neighborhoods are with good schools....no more than $600,000 for house though.....we want to live BELOW our means....I have a friend in North Reston in a beautiful $1 million home but that is out of the question for us

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:wondering where the nice family-oriented neighborhoods are with good schools....no more than $600,000 for house though.....we want to live BELOW our means....I have a friend in North Reston in a beautiful $1 million home but that is out of the question for us

You'll find better prices in Herndon, but I don't think the schools are as good. There are lots of houses and townhomes in that range in both areas. Sunrise Valley ES and Forest Edge ES are both AAP centers. You should be able to find many older homes with nice yards near either school. They both feed to Hughes MS and South Lakes HS. We've only been in Reston a while but we love the sense of community. It feels like we've alwaye been here, we have good friends and neighbors, our kids are very active, etc. I'd recommend our neighborhood, but it sounds a bit out of your range. I kind of kick myself that we didn't move here sooner. Our old neighborhood was very keep-to-yourself and we never knew anyone, despite a lot of effort. Here there always things happening at Reston Town Center or at the community center. It works well for us since we both work in NoVa. Not sure it's a great commute downtown though.

[Anonymous]

You can find good townhomes in herndon 20171..our kids go to mcnair es which is really good, the middle school rachel carson is one of the best and high school is westfields which is also good,

[Anonymous]

Look for homes in Herndon 20171 area- not to be confused with Herndon city or 20170. Even better, check out homes in the part sometimes snobishly called Oak Hill. This area has nice schools- Floris and Oak Hill. As someone correctly pointed out, $600K will get you a townhome and if you are lucky, maybe a SFH. Reston is also excellent but very expensive.

Do a bit more research before committing to McNair. There are numerous disparaging reports and the county is trying to raise it's standard by making it a GT center.

"Preliminary 2006-07 Standards of Learning test results have been received. A small number of Fairfax County Title I schools—including McNair Elementary School—did not meet the standards for Adequate Yearly Progress under the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law."
http://www.fcps.edu/nclb/Mcnair/mesnclb.htm

"Under the federal No Child Left Behind law, McNair is technically considered a "failing" school since it has not met state standardized testing targets over at least two years. McNair is also a "Title I" school. A large enough percentage of the McNair’s population qualifies for English-as-a-Second Language services and free or reduced priced lunches that it receives extra federal money, called "Title I" funding. "
http://www.connectionnewspapers.com/articleprint.asp?article=323607&paper=66&cat=104

[Anonymous]

I just have stopped paying attention to NCLB ratings. They are complete BS and people don't really understand how it works. A school can be considered failing if 95% of the student body is not present on testing day, even if the kids all score highly on the test. I'd really go more by parent feedback and NOT NCLB Pass/Fail.

[Anonymous]

Even if you ignore NCLB rating, this sentence is very telling- A large enough percentage of the McNair’s population qualifies for English-as-a-Second Language services and free or reduced priced lunches that it receives extra federal money, called "Title I" funding.

We have friends who have chosen to keep their child in in-school GT at Floris rather than send him to "McNair GT center".

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Even if you ignore NCLB rating, this sentence is very telling- A large enough percentage of the McNair’s population qualifies for English-as-a-Second Language services and free or reduced priced lunches that it receives extra federal money, called "Title I" funding.

We have friends who have chosen to keep their child in in-school GT at Floris rather than send him to "McNair GT center".

which just means it draws a large percentage of lower-income and/or immigrant children. I get that scares a lot of people, but it doesn't really affect my feelings on a school's quality.

Maybe I'm the only white parent who would NOT be against sending my kid to a Title I school?

[Anonymous]

I don't mean to be a snob here but if you are every concerned about reselling your property in the short term you do need to pay attention to school district.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't mean to be a snob here but if you are every concerned about reselling your property in the short term you do need to pay attention to school district.

and not everyone can afford a home in one of the "better" school districts. Not everyone has Great Falls/McLean money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't mean to be a snob here but if you are every concerned about reselling your property in the short term you do need to pay attention to school district.

and not everyone can afford a home in one of the "better" school districts. Not everyone has Great Falls/McLean money.

Rachel carson ms + feeders are just as good if not better than the longfellow neighbourhoods; the population of more recent but educated immigrants in the oak hill/oakton areas is just as academically inclined as the professional classes in great falls/mclean - they just haven't had as much time to accumulate wealth - luckily for those who can't buy into or prefer the ethnic mix of western fairfax, this allows people to have a choice that is less correlated with hoe prices - although 800K is probably closer to the sfh buy in for these areas.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Rachel carson ms + feeders are just as good if not better than the longfellow neighbourhoods; the population of more recent but educated immigrants in the oak hill/oakton areas is just as academically inclined as the professional classes in great falls/mclean - they just haven't had as much time to accumulate wealth - luckily for those who can't buy into or prefer the ethnic mix of western fairfax, this allows people to have a choice that is less correlated with hoe prices - although 800K is probably closer to the sfh buy in for these areas.

The Carson feeders vary a lot. Floris is majority Asian, with a lot of VERY driven, hyper-competitive parents who all expect their kids to attend TJ. Coates and McNair are Title I. Fox Mill and Crossfield are good.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Rachel carson ms + feeders are just as good if not better than the longfellow neighbourhoods; the population of more recent but educated immigrants in the oak hill/oakton areas is just as academically inclined as the professional classes in great falls/mclean - they just haven't had as much time to accumulate wealth - luckily for those who can't buy into or prefer the ethnic mix of western fairfax, this allows people to have a choice that is less correlated with hoe prices - although 800K is probably closer to the sfh buy in for these areas.

The Carson feeders vary a lot. Floris is majority Asian, with a lot of VERY driven, hyper-competitive parents who all expect their kids to attend TJ. Coates and McNair are Title I. Fox Mill and Crossfield are good.

that assumes you aren't asian and wouldn't find fox mill and crossfield to be too lax an environment

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:that assumes you aren't asian and wouldn't find fox mill and crossfield to be too lax an environment

Maybe they do. Lots of whites are moving out of the Floris area to Loudoun County for friendly neighbors and a healthier school environment.